Correlation Between Sunshine Duration and Climatic Variables in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Abstract

This study aims at examining the correlation between daily sunshine duration and climatic variables such as Maximum Temperature, Minimum Temperature, Humidity and Rainfall across the Democratic Republic of Congo in order to determine which climatic variables influence mainly the daily sunshine duration in this country. So, daily sunshine duration data and climatic data from European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) have been used to calculate the Pearson correlation at 95% of confidence between sunshine duration and aforementioned climatic variables. It was noticed that correlation between sunshine duration and Humidity ranges from-0.45 to -0.53 at 95% confidence, from June to September; it ranges from 0.65 to 0.92 at 95% confidence in other months. In contrast, sunshine duration demonstrates weak to moderate positive correlations ranging from 0.14 to 0.32, at 95% confidence, with Rainfall, from May to September while it is showing strong negative correlations ranging from-0.53 to -0.68, at 95% confidence, during January, March, November, and December, and varying degrees of negative correlation in other months. Furthermore, a weak positive correlation between sunshine duration and Maximum Temperature is observed in January, June, and August less than or equal 0.08, becoming weakly positive in February and July, and weakly negative in November and December, that means - 0.05 and -0.04 respectively. Conversely, sunshine duration shows a negative correlation with Minimum Temperature throughout the year, except for March and July where weak positive correlations are noted that means 0.07 and 0.03 at 95% confidence. Although Kongo Central and Kinshasa exhibit the lowest sunshine duration values, their average Rainfall and humidity values are not the highest among variables studied. This suggests that other factors influence significantly sunshine duration in the DRC beyond these variables.